Mr. Steady is a no-brainer. This is the story of Ariel Furado (28) of the Kiwoom Heroes.
Furado started the game against the Gocheok KIA Tigers on the 14th and contributed to the team’s 2-1 come-from-behind victory by allowing five hits and one run in seven innings. He gave up two walks, but minimized his runs with six strikeouts at the right place. Including the game against SSG Landers (8 scoreless innings) on the 8th, 15 scoreless innings in the last two games. He postponed his 11th win of the season to the next opportunity, but lowered his ERA to 3.19 (3.28). He is third in the league after Kyle Hart (NC Dinos, 2.34) and James Nail (KIA, 2.73).먹튀검증
In the match against KIA, his crisis management ability shone. Furado let go of runners in every inning except for the seventh inning. In the second inning, with one out and the third base, he had a timely hit by Choi Won-joon and allowed the first run. However, he stopped short of hitting the follow-up batters in the third inning with two outs and runners on the first and third bases, and in the fourth inning with one out. In the fifth inning with one out and runners on the third base, Na Sung-bum and Socrates Brito were struck out swinging and hitting a ground ball to shortstop, respectively. In the sixth inning with one out and runners on the first base, he induced Kim to play a double play by the second baseman to fill in the out count.
According to Kiwoom analysis, Furado threw a total of six pitches (97 pitches). In addition to fastballs (39) with the maximum speed of 148 kilometers per hour, the team also mixed various pitches, including two-seam fastballs (11), change-up (23), slider (11), curveball (9), and cut fastballs (4). KIA had no chance to beat the batters as it overwhelmed them with power and controlled their performance. With his good pitching in the match against KIA, Furado achieved his 19th quality start of this season (QS, more than six innings and less than three earned runs), and firmly maintained his position as the sole leader in the category. Coincidentally, second place in the QS category was Furado’s teammate Enmanuel de Heyesus (16th inning). The two players are “proud” of Kiwoom, the lowest ranking team in professional baseball.
“I think it was mainly because I mixed all the pitches I had and threw them in various ways. I tried to put as many strikes as possible in a low place as possible offensively,” Furado said after the match against KIA. “I think that led to a high strike rate (71.1 percent),” he said. “I pitched aggressively (in the first and third bases with one out in the top of the fourth inning), thinking that I must strike out the next batter. I thought it was a mental battle when I had a runner, so I focused only on my pitching.”